Cultivating authority, evading responsibility

The prime minister will take you only up to a point. The Centre does not carry any credibility, because there it has no genuine interlocutors. There is no other leader who can carry the imprimatur that they are acting on behalf of the nation, who can provide a healing touch when needed. More and more of our conflicts will require this kind of constant political engagement. Rahul and Sonia Gandhi, in political terms, carry that mantle as much as anyone does; but they steadfastly refuse to risk it on anything other than politically easy welfare schemes. The scandal of Indian politics is not simply that the prime minister is politically weak; it is that those who are politically strong are constantly running away from political responsibility.

And it has sent a message: the purpose of politics is not solving problems; it is the evasion of responsibility. [IE]

Absolutely agree with Mr Mehta! It will be better if MMSingh abdicated delegating responsibility to Rahul if only to get the latter to do something at all- even bad. Also, Sonia Gandhi can stop caring about her image and actually say something other than personal reminiscences of her family. The opposition is just a set of bickering men and women focussin on issues like ram sethu or shivaji’s life history when important foreign policy issues need to be addressed.

Absolutely agree with Mr Mehta! It will be better if MMSingh abdicated delegating responsibility to Rahul if only to get the latter to do something at all- even bad. Also, Sonia Gandhi can stop caring about her image and actually say something other than personal reminiscences of her family. The opposition is just a set of bickering men and women focussin on issues like ram sethu or shivaji’s life history when important foreign policy issues need to be addressed.